not human but muse......... anathema and avatar. Sydney's Kings Cross .... aahh the possibilities are endless!

Wednesday, 2 November 2011

Oh but of course dear sir .... it is ridiculous!

I had a conversation with a fella,
some would say gentleman,
who said to me ..... I don't know how you write
poems dear sir.
And in the course of the same
conversation I said ...... I don't know how you write
novels. All that plotty plot plot ...
all that ..... he said she said he went she sighed.
I also made the ambitious statement
that that one day I would try myself,
maybe. I also let him know that in my opinion most humble
it was an amazing form that eluded me.
He said .... ahh but poetry
is the esoteric art, the beauty but captured
in a turn of phrase. The moment held for a moment,
the world so ambiguous and yet so obvious.
Beautifully put, I responded as I scoured the
room for something poetic to inspire me. But of course
it was always there. Right there in front of me.
I paused .... and then he said
and how you end those lines and
then start them
again. With scant regard for .... ahh endings or
starts.
I really did wonder what he meant. Funny though ...
because you see it's different
when you talk about it, unlike when you write about it.
Which is what you do if you are a poet.
And I don't confess to be a good
one ..... now back to the story ...
I said, No ... oh no my learned colleague.
It is I who have but praise
for the long form.
Lifting the caraf of pinot in the direction
of both our glasses, I continued ...
and how you hold a story together and beguile
for hundreds of pages, twisting, turning, cascading
with nothing but the purest of regard
for the dear reader. It is a triumph. A grand triumph indeed.
It would be as if ..... and now in full Parisian twoddle talk
as if the Maillot jaune
at literature's very own Tour de Francais
were worn by old Proust himself.

Well if that didn't bring the roof down!!

And so the night continued .... praise and pinot
and not a single word written.